The countrywide prolonged lockdown has prompted many to rummage their heirlooms and it is this search that has led film director Sandip Ray to stumble upon a letter written by Kishore Kumar to his father Satyajit Ray way back in 1963.

The letter, typewritten in English and dated November 4, is a short three-para one, but the tone is so heartwarming that Sandip Ray has shared it with Kishore Kumar’s son Amit Kumar, who shared it on social media describing it as “priceless”.

The singer wrote to the maestro expressing his gratitude for Ray selecting him to playback for a film, but expressed his inability to rush from Mumbai (then Bombay) to Kolkata (then Calcutta) to record the song since he had consecutive dates in Bombay.

“I would deem it a greater pleasure to sing in your film under your direction,” wrote the singer.

Kumar addressed Ray as Manikmama (Manik uncle, Manik was the pet name of Ray) and mentioned that he left the matter of remuneration completely to the director.

Though he said that he could not come to Calcutta, Kumar invited Ray with his wife – whom he referred to as Monkumashi (Ray’s wife Bijoya Ray’s pet name was Monku) – to stay with him in Bombay and record the song any time between “26th and 30th” of November.

He also offered to arrange for the musicians for the recording for a reasonable amount.

Though the name of the film or the song was not mentioned in the letter, Ray offered Kishore Kumar to sing for Charulata that was released the next year and that the director later described as his most satisfying.

Ray later went to Bombay and got the song recorded. It was a famous Tagore number “Ami chini go chini tomare”.

Incidentally, the two families were related to each other and Amit Kumar and Sandip Ray studied at the same school in south Kolkata in their childhood.

Sandip Ray found the letter at their residence at 1 Bishop Lefroy Road in south Kolkata where Satyajit Ray spent the last few daeces of his life.

Sandip Ray also said that rummaging through his father’s belongings he found many negatives of pictures that he hadn’t seen earlier.

He also found letters written to Ray by Japanese maestro Akira Kurosawa and British legend Richard Attenborough. Kurosawa was an ardent admirer of Ray and wrote, “Not to have seen the cinema of Ray means existing in the world without seeing the sun or the moon.”